ABOUT SARAH
Sarah West is a somatic healing arts practitioner, dream worker, writer, artist, naturalist, and wilderness guide living amidst the wild beauty of Moab, Utah. Her work is centered in a deep listening to the body, psyche, and soul, and the inner currents that shape a life.
Through one-on-one sessions, retreats, and photographic work, she creates spaces where people can come home to themselves, to live a life that is more alive, aligned, and deeply true.
Ways to Work Together
One-on-One Sessions
Offered online and in-person, these sessions offer trauma-informed support to meet the places within you that are stuck in fear, self-doubt, repeating patterns, and painful past experiences, so you can move towards a fuller expression of yourself. Learn More.
Modalities
| Internal Family Systems (IFS) | Somatic Healing | Expressive Arts Healing | Dream Work Sessions | Mindfulness | Nature-centered Healing Practices |
Group Retreats
Held in Moab, Utah these are spaces where your body, your muse, and landscape meet, and where creativity becomes a way of returning to what already lives within you.
October 8th-12th | Women’s Creativity Retreat Learn More.
Mythic Portraits
Photography for inner work— in relationship with myth, soul, and story. Offered in the desert or forest landscapes in the Moab area.
Learn More.
SARAH WEST is a professionally registered Somatic Healing Arts Practitioner and Educator, and a Professional Member of the International Somatic Education and Therapy Association (ISMETA). She meets the high standards of practice and upholds the code of ethics.
MY BACKGROUND
My work has grown from years of professional training, personal practice, and a lifelong curiosity about what helps people heal, transform, and live more meaningful lives.
For more than twenty years, I have worked as a multidisciplinary artist in visual art, writing, photography, and movement. This creative practice continues to shape how I listen, attune, and respond with sensitivity in my work with others.
As a professionally registered somatic practitioner, I have been in private practice for over seven years, integrating somatic healing, dreamwork, expressive arts, Jungian psychology, mindfulness, and nature-based approaches to healing and inner work. My work bridges nature, body, psyche, and soul.
My professional training includes five years at the Eastwest Somatics Institute, where I studied somatic healing, embodied dreamwork, nervous system repatterning, expressive arts, movement-based therapies, and ecosomatics. I also completed three years of training with the Animas Valley Institute as a Wild Mind Guide, focusing on depth psychology, dreamwork, ritual, and nature-based soul work.
In addition, I have trained extensively in mindfulness meditation and facilitated mindfulness groups for many years. I hold three yoga teacher certifications and have guided both individuals and groups through nature retreats and wilderness quests.
I earned a Bachelor of Science in Anthropology from the University of Utah where I did graduate studies in Human Evolutionary Ecology.
My cross-cultural learning has also been an important part of my path. I have spent time with the Ju/’hoansi Bushmen in the Kalahari Desert and learned from Australian Aboriginals. These experiences deepened my understanding that healing is always in relationship with the body, dreams, myth, art, animals, plants, community, and the earth. This relational, animistic sensibility informs all my work in the world.
Of all my teachers, the natural world has been the most enduring. I have lived close to wilderness for most of my adult life, including years near Zion National Park and in Moab. The land continues to be a steady source of guidance, wisdom, and belonging, and it remains at the heart of both my life and my work.
For those interested in my detailed professional training and background, you’ll find a more comprehensive list below.
“The doors to the world of the wild Self are few but precious. If you have a deep scar, that is a door, if you have an old, old story, that is a door. If you love the sky and the water so much you almost cannot bear it, that is a door. If you yearn for a deeper life, a full life, a sane life, that is a door.”
—Clarissa Pinkola Estés
The landscape that shapes my work
My life has been enriched by years of engaging in earth-based, somatic, artistic, and contemplative practices.
Living as an artist has taught me the potency of creative expression—for healing, discovery, and contact with the deeper currents of the soul and psyche.
My bond with the earth, and kinship with the living world— the stars, the wind moving through leaves, the vastness of the night, the cliffs at dawn, the creatures who roam at twilight— feeds my wonder, curiosity, and deep listening. It provides the ground from which I stand.
My devotion to the mysteries of the soul has been shaped by time in wilderness and through regular solo wilderness quests.
My dedication to my own healing, to beauty-making, and to living with meaning and reciprocity informs how I meet others.
Together, these practices shape how I hold space—with depth, presence, care, and respect for each person’s inner wisdom.
TRAININGS & CERTIFICATIONS
Somatic Healing
Somatic Therapy Training Program with Sondra Fraleigh at Eastwest Somatics Institute (2015-2020)
Nervous System Repatterning, Expressive Arts Healing, Excavation of Body Memory, Trauma-Informed Therapy Approaches, Ecosomatics, Dance Movement Therapy, Movement Imagery. Embodied Dream Work, Butoh, Focusing, Contact Unwinding, Effective Communication, Authentic Movement, Mindfulness, Somatic Education Training, Land-to-Water Yoga Training (500 hours), Somatic Bodywork Training (Feldenkrais, Craniosacral, The Alexander Technique)
Internal Family Systems (IFS): Parts Work
IFS Therapy Certification IFSCA Training with Derek Scott (2021)
Working with Unattached Burdens in IFS Therapy with Robert Falconer (2021)
Healing Medical Syndromes using IFS with Lissa Rankin and Dick Schwartz (2021)
Somatic Parts Work Certification with Francis Booth (2021)
IFS Circle: An introductory online program (2020)
Animas Valley Institute: Nature-Based Soul Work Training
Wild Minds Training Program (2019–2021)
Immersive training included Soulcentric Dreamwork, Council and Mirroring practices, Shadow Work intensive, Wilderness Quest facilitation, Soulcraft intensive. and creative process work in nature including Courting the Muse.
Co-led Animas Valley Institute group Wilderness Quest (2021).
Somatic Experiencing: Body-Centered Healing
Principles of Somatic Experiencing (2020)
Healing Trauma: Restoring the wisdom of the body with Peter Levine
Yoga as a Neurobiological-based Therapeutic Strategy with Joann Lutz
Polyvagal Institute: Nervous System Theory
Polyvagal Theory: A Neuroscience View Explaining Reactions to Safety and Threat with Dr. Stephen Porges, course (2019)
Hakomi Institute: Somatic Healing
Somatic Trauma Healing with the Hakomi Method with Manuela Mischke-Reeds (2020)
Hakomi Mindful Psychotherapy: An Experimental Introduction (2020)
Mindfulness Meditation
Mindfulness Meditation Teacher Training with Tara Brach & Jack Kornfield (2019)
Mindfulness of Race, Retreat with Ruth King (2019)
Led the Zion Canyon Meditation Group, facilitated weekly sitting meditation, mindful walking, mindful eating, and compassionate communication (2014-2020)
Participated in 15 multi-day mindfulness meditation silent retreats (2014-2020)
Yoga
Spirit Rock Yoga Teacher Training Program, 200 hours with Djuna Devereaux, Tias Little, Leslie Booker, and Ann Cushman (2019)
Eastwest Somatics Institute Yoga Teacher Training, 500 hours Somatic Land-to-Water Yoga
Gaia Tree Yoga Teacher Training, 200 hours, Springdale, Utah
Dance
Studied and practiced various forms of dance including: Modern Dance, Butoh, Metamorphic Dance, Authentic Movement, Ecosomatic Dance, 5Rhythms, and Contact Improv (2000-2025)
Wilderness First Responder
Wilderness Medicine of Utah, weeklong WFR intensive with Brian Essig (2023)
Wilderness First Responder Re-certification (2024)
“Sarah West is a river of love, compassion, and wisdom. She cares deeply for the earth and all life and dedicates her life to helping others. Love is the power that drives her and love is what she gives. Working with her is to work with a great soul with a great heart and is a huge privilege.”
-Micheal Philips, Nature Advocate
If you feel called to explore this work, I’d love to meet with you in a free 20-minute consultation.
